The Space Between
by Southern Sky
Summary: The moments taking place offcamera during Dino Thunder: Thunder Storm were some of the most significant of all for Blake and Tori.
1. Chapter 1

**Wednesday, 3:45 p.m.**

**Reefside, California**

Stepping inside the Cybercafe, Blake Bradley sighed.

The dimly lit room was a haven from the harsh sunlight outside, and the air-conditioning was a welcome change from the oppressive heat of the California afternoon.

Even after showering and getting a change of clothes, he still felt the sweat from the track.

"Man, I need something cold to drink," Jesse said. "How about you?"

"Sure," Blake replied, and followed his teammate toward the counter, rolling his shoulder to work out the kinks from practice that morning.

A drink would be good, but what he really needed was some sleep.

Preferably in his own bed, rather than on a lumpy fold-out in the team bus or in a motel room full of rowdy teammates.

Sometimes being on the road wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

Blake liked the other Factory Blue riders, he'd made friends among the team and Roger Hanna was good to his riders, especially when his riders continued to bring in victories at one race after another, but he missed Blue Bay Harbor.

He hadn't been home in over a month, and weekend visits were the most he'd been able to manage in the months before that.

It was a busy time of year in the motocross world.

But after Nationals he'd be able to take a break and spend some time back home.

The off-season was what got him through the five months out of the year that he was constantly on the go, but it still wasn't enough, it never would be.

_You can't have your cake and eat it to, bro, _he could almost hear Hunter saying.

It was the price he paid to do what he loved.

But, as Hunter liked to so tactfully point out every once and while, the people he loved were paying for it, too.

His heart ached at the thought of Tori's smile and her bubbly laughter, which just didn't sound the same on the phone. He called every night before he went to sleep, it was part of their routine, but it was a cheap replacement for being there with her.

When it was first announced that the AMA Motocross Championship was going to be held in California, Blake had been ecstatic.

Reefside was only a few hours drive up the coast from Blue Bay Harbor, after all.

But it turned out it wasn't easy for a bunch of senseis to get away from their duties at a Ninja Academy, there were classes to teach and students to attend to, so even though Blake had been able to get passes for the entire week, Tori, Hunter and the others wouldn't be able to make it up until the finals.

He was disappointed, of course, but he understood.

Responsibility was central to a ninja's life.

"Here you boys go," the girl behind the counter said with a smile, setting down two drinks in front of them. "Hope you enjoy."

"Thanks," Blake said, and Jesse pulled out his wallet to pay.

"Hey."

Turning, Blake found himself face-to-face with a girl a few years younger than he was, dressed in yellow and black, wavy brown hair framing a pretty face with big brown eyes and a slightly awkward expression.

"Do we... know each other?" the girl asked, biting her lip.

"I don't think so," he said, trying not to smile at the line. "I'm Blake," he shook her hand, then gestured at Jesse, who lifted a hand in greeting. "This is Jesse."

Jesse, ever the mysterious one, just nodded.

"I'm Kira," the girl said, nodding back, then returned her attention to Blake, frowning. "You just look so familiar to me," she insisted.

"Do you follow motocross?" he asked, taking off his hat.

He half-expected her to recognize him once she got a good look at his face, that was how the girls following the tour usually played it, but this girl surprised him by shaking her head, looking more confused than ever.

"No," she said. "Why is that what you do?"

Okay, so maybe she wasn't a groupie, after all.

Blake opened his mouth to answer, but a lanky teenage boy popped up just then, sporting a t-shirt with a LaRocca slogan.

"Can you sign this, man?" the kid asked breathlessly.

"Sure," Blake agreed, but instead of reaching for the napkin the kid was offering, he grabbed his hat off the counter and signed it with the pen the kid was holding. "There you go."

"Dude, this is totally sick!" the kid cried enthusiastically. "You rock!"

The kid reminded him of Dustin and, unable to keep from grinning, Blake watched as he scurried off to a table where his friends were waiting, and a chorus of whoops erupted from their side of the room, making him shake his head ruefully.

Hunter and Shane were going to rib on him, if they ever heard about this.

And knowing Jesse, his teammate would be more than happy to inform them about it after the finals.

"Okay," Kira said slowly. "So you're famous for riding a motorcycle?"

Jesse snickered, making his way to the fuseball table.

"Don't be so surprised," Blake said dryly, touching her arm gently to brush past her as he joined Jesse at the fuseball table.

They had a smaller table on the bus, and it had become sort of a rivalry among the guys.

Jesse thought he was some sort of prophesized fuseball player, since no one ever beat him, and one of these days Blake was going to have to get Dustin to play him, just so they could bring Jesse's ego down a notch or two.

"Oh, no," Kira said, following them. "It's just I didn't know you could be famous for that."

Fair enough, most people didn't.

Besides, she was cute when she stammered, kind of like Tori.

"Well, why don't you come see for yourself?" Blake suggested. "The Nationals are this week at Reefside MX Park."

With Tori, Dustin and Shane unable to get away from the Wind Academy until the weekend, and Hunter just as obligated to finish teaching his weekly classes at the Thunder Academy before heading up, it would be nice to have people around to watch him race.

And this girl, Kira, she seemed like a pretty cool girl.

In fact, she really did kind of remind him of Tori, in a way he couldn't quite define.

Which meant she was bound to have some decent friends.

"Bring some friends," he told her with a smile. "I'll get you passes."

"Are you asking me out?" Kira asked.

Blake almost laughed, but there was a hint of shyness in her eyes that made him take extra care to contain his amusement. "No," he assured her lightly. "It's nothing like that. Look, part of being a rider is spreading the word about our sport. To get people to come out who never would on their own."

People like Cam, who would never have been caught dead at a track before meeting them.

"I promise you, you'll totally be into it," Blake told her, seeing her hesitance.

"Here you go," Jesse spoke up, holding out a couple of passes to her, and Blake rolled his eyes, knowing the reason his teammate carried extra passes around whenever a race was coming up.

For a notorious flirt like Jesse, those passes came in handy.

"Okay, thanks," Kira said, and gave a little wave as she turned and headed back to her friend.

Blake watched her go, not oblivious to the murderous look that the guy waiting for her was giving him, and shook his head, smiling, before turning back to Jesse.

His teammate was smirking, eyes bright with amusement. "I can't wait to tell Tori you're picking up chicks in a cybercafe."

"Ha ha, very funny," Blake said, reaching over to punch him in the arm. "You know, she kind of reminds of Tor... I can't figure out what it is, though. There's just something about her that's really familiar."

Jesse looked after Kira and shrugged. "I don't see it, man."

"That's because you don't know Tori like I do," Blake pointed out with a chuckle.

"Lucky for you," Jesse quipped, flashing one of his lopsided smiles. "One of these days I might just steal your wife away."

Blake just rolled his eyes.

Satisfied with himself, Jesse gave the nearest handle a sharp, expert twist and the ball shot across the table, squeezing through the spaces between the players, and shot into the hole in front of Blake with a loud clunk.

"Cheater," Blake accused wryly.

"Sore loser," Jesse threw back in kind.

"That doesn't count," Blake declared, moving to his side of the table. "We're starting over."

"Sure," Jesse sneered. "Like that's going to help you."

Sure enough, it didn't really help him, and five minutes later Jesse was pumping his fists into the air, partaking in a dramatic victory celebration, and Blake was vowing that it didn't matter because he was going to kick his ass on the track this week anyway.

As they made their way out the door, Kira looked up from her books and waved, and Blake nodded back with a smile.

He hoped she did show up at the race, even if she brought the surly looking kid next to her.

Hanging out with some cool people like Kira would kill some time until the weekend, until his brother and friends were there to cheer him on instead.

Until Tori was there to kiss him for luck.

Stepping out into the sunlight, Blake absently reached a hand to the chain around his neck, feeling the familiar shape of the ring attached to it beneath his shirt. The chain had come after the ring, a present from Hunter after his brother had seen how easy it was to lose a ring at the track.

Days that he was going to be in gear most of the time, like today, he normally kept the ring at his neck all day.

But suddenly his chest was feeling empty, and his left hand bare, so Blake unclapsed the chain and slid off the golden wedding band, placing it back onto his finger where it belonged.

He brushed the smooth surface with his fingertips and sighed.

It was going to be a long week, knowing how close he was to being reunited with Tori again, but it would be worth the wait.

And once they were together, everything would be perfect.


	2. Chapter 2

**Thursday, 9:13 a.m.**

**Blue Bay Harbor, California**

It was a beautiful day.

The sky was a perfect shade of blue, without a cloud in sight.

Patches of sunlight streamed through the treetops overhead, warming her face whenever she walked through one, and a gentle morning breeze ruffled her hair gently.

"We're almost there," Shane called from ahead of her.

He glanced back at her over his shoulder, frowning in concern when he noticed that she was trailing behind, so Tori flashed him a smile to let him know everything was all right. She was just taking her time, using the hike up the bluffs as an excuse to clear her mind.

She'd been anxious for days now, counting down to the coming weekend.

To the Nationals up in Reefside, the final AMA race of the year.

To Blake's homecoming.

He'd been home to visit for a few days the month before, but the visit had been all too short and she'd had to share him with Hunter, of course.

They had joint custody of Blake, as Hunter liked to joke.

He wanted to see his brother as much as Tori did during the brief trips Blake could manage back to Blue Bay Harbor, but Hunter somehow managed to make sure that he disappeared for a while over the weekend so that the two of them could find some time alone.

Time together was precious these days, due to Blake's hectic schedule, and sometimes it felt like he was being whisked away again when he'd only just gotten home.

She'd known it would be that way when she agreed to marry him, though.

Blake hadn't made any effort to sugarcoat how difficult the first few years would be while he was still riding for Factory Blue, but they both knew he wouldn't be riding forever.

What he was going to do after that, she didn't know and she doubted Blake did either.

He'd toyed with the idea of teaching, since he had an open invitation at both the Wind and Thunder Academies, and had mentioned something about maybe opening up a motocross school for kids someday the last time they talked about the future.

For now, he was loving the life of a racer, and Tori was happy for him, even if it meant they spent so much time apart.

She had known it would be hard to say goodbye when he left for the start of the season just four months after they got married, but in her heart Tori had known it was worth it, that a little loneliness now and then at this point in their lives was nothing when they had their whole lives to share with one another. Her parents hadn't been fully supportive of the idea at first, but they'd genuinely liked Blake and once they realized she was going to marry him whether they agreed or not, they'd done their best to make not only Blake but Hunter, as well, feel like part of their family.

As for Hunter, well, he still claimed that Blake would never have worked up the nerve to ask her if he hadn't kept prodding his little brother about it.

He liked to bring that up from time to time, to remind her that she owed him.

Usually when he wanted to borrow her van.

Even before Blake proposed to her, Tori had found herself spending a lot of time with Hunter whenever Blake was on the road with Factory Blue.

Although she and Hunter had been friends before, it was during Blake's absence that they really connected.

They were both missing Blake, so they'd initially bonded over that, but with Dustin always busy with Marah and Shane so focused on the Wind Academy, soon enough she and Hunter had sort of fallen into a comfortable routine.

She talked to him almost every day by phone, to trade horror stories about their students or just to catch up.

And at least once a week Hunter would streak back to Blue Bay Harbor and they'd have lunch and hang out for a while. Sometimes they'd see a movie or something with Dustin, Marah and Shane, and Cam would join them when he had time, but usually it was just the two of them. That was when they ended up either at the track- where Hunter did his best to help her improve her riding- or at the beach- where she'd spent several weeks teaching him to surf.

He turned out to be a better student than Blake, though not as entertaining to watch.

Not to mention a better motocross teacher, but Tori suspected that might have been because with Blake she was always too distracted by how close he was to her.

Or maybe Hunter was just a natural at teaching.

He'd certainly surprised them all with how quickly he'd fallen into the role of sensei.

The first time she'd visited him at the Thunder Academy, with Dustin in tow, Tori had been taken aback by how serious and calm Hunter could be when there were students present.

As soon as the students left, though, he and Dustin were right back to their old selves.

He was still brooding and intense, but there was a lightness in him that wasn't there when they first met. Teaching agreed with him better than she would have expected, especially his classes with the younger students, all of whom practically idolized him. The preteen girls had crushes on him, the boys wanted to be him... Sensei Bradley, as one of her own students had pointed out once after Hunter visited the Wind Academy and guest-taught a class, was _cool_.

Although Hunter was technically a year older than she was, in some ways Tori felt like she'd watched him grow up in recent years.

Their time as Rangers had changed them all.

Dustin was wiser now, more thoughtful beneath his playful exterior. He was the sensei that students having difficulty went to for help, because he somehow managed to point out their mistakes without making it seem like he was correcting them.

And Shane, he was the sensei all the students wanted to be like.

Strong, stoic, but still approachable.

He'd become a younger version of Sensei Watanabe in a lot of ways, at least while they were on Academy grounds.

Hand him a skateboard and he was still that thrill-seeking teenager she remembered.

And he was still as competitive as ever.

With the annual InterAcademy demonstration match fast approaching, both Shane and Hunter were focused on preparing their best students.

It was a friendly competition, of course, with the Thunder Academy playing host to not only the students from the Wind Academy but also to students from three other Ninja Academies across the country, but Shane and Hunter always managed to turn it into a macho contest over whose students were better.

This year, though, Tori had a few promising students of her own.

Maybe it was wrong, but she was secretly hoping that Mei-Lin, her fourteen year old prodigy student, would wipe the floor with Hunter and Shane's favorites.

Just to wipe those smug looks off their faces.

"Dude, how stoked are you for this weekend?" Dustin's voice drifted back to her ears, and Tori couldn't help smiling at his enthusiasm. "The Nationals are going to rock, and Blake is totally going to kick ass."

Same old Dustin.

As much as they'd all grown up since their days as Rangers, all of them with their own lives to lead now, it was nice to know some things never changed. Dustin might have been a respected sensei, but he was still the same lovable goof he'd always been.

"Pretty 'stoked', man," Shane answered, and she could practically hear him his eyes rolling in his tone. "Seriously, though," he said, looking back over his shoulder at Tori. "It's gonna be awesome to see Blake in action again. It's been ages since I was able to get out to one of his races. Watching them on tv just doesn't have the same kick."

"Tell me about it," Tori said wryly.

Of course, when Blake's races were televised she got a play-by-play from Dustin and Hunter, who insisted on shouting at the tv as if Blake could hear them.

"I just wish we could have gone up for the whole week," Dustin bemoaned, kicking at a stone in his path.

"Yeah," Tori sighed. "Me, too."

Dustin gave her a sympathetic look and Shane shook his head. "Don't look so down, you guys," he told them, climbing the crest of the hill. "First thing after classes let out for the weekend, we're piling in the van and heading up to Reefside. And Marah offered to pay for the gas, remember?"

"Good thing, too," Dustin muttered. "It'll mean she has less money to go shopping with."

Tori hid a smile at that.

Marah and Kapri were legendary for their need of shopaholics anonymous, and the last time that the girls came home from a day at the mall, Tori knew that Dustin had nearly gone pale looking at the receipts.

It was lucky for him that they'd had Sensei's credit card and not his.

After leaving Lothor and helping them defeat his little army of evil minions, Marah and Kapri had ended up moving in with Sensei Watanabe, decidedly the more tolerable uncle, and they'd even adopted the Watanabe name as their own after living at the Wind Academy for a while.

Cam was mostly exasperated by his cousins, but Tori knew he had a certain affection for them just the same.

Kapri took some getting used to. Reformed though she might be, she hadn't lost all of her abrasive qualities just yet, and Tori thanked fate every day for the fact that Cam had taken his cousins into one of his classes, so that she hadn't gotten stuck with Kapri.

Marah, it turned out, though, was pretty cool.

She was a little too bubbly sometimes for Tori's tastes, but it was nice to have a girl around in their little boy's club.

And she made Dustin happy, which was good enough for Tori.

"There he is," Shane's voice broke through her reverie, and Tori lifted her head to see Sensei Watanabe in the distance, standing on the edge of the bluffs and staring out at the ocean.

"Sensei," Tori called worriedly. "Is everything all right?"

"No, Tori," he sighed, turning to face them with a troubled look. "I am afraid it's not."

"Dude, you don't look so hot," Dustin observed with a frown, as the three of them drew to a halt in front of their teacher. "I mean... no offense or anything."

The corners of Sensei Watanabe's mouth twitched faintly. "None taken, Dustin."

"So," Shane cleared his throat. "What's up?"

"He is back," Sensei Watanabe pronounced softly, turning his head to stare out at the ocean once more, as if could somehow provide him with the answers he was seeking. "Lothor is back."

Tori drew a sharp breath, her chest tightening.

"Wait," Dustin said, shaking his head. "Lothor can't be back."

"Yeah, no way," Shane agreed.

"We saw him disappear into the Abyss of Evil," Tori added, and looked to Sensei Watanabe for confirmation, but he just smiled sadly, his eyes dim with something she couldn't quite define, and her heart sank as she realized that he was serious.

Dustin cursed under his breath, and given the circumstances Sensei didn't chastise him.

Out of the corner of her eye, Tori saw Shane glance in her direction, and she looked up to meet his gaze, knowing they were thinking the same thing.

He would be coming for them.

Lothor would want revenge on the ones who defeated him, and he knew right where to find them.

But at least they had each other.

Hunter and Blake were on their own, with no idea what was happening.

They would have to contact Hunter at the Thunder Academy as soon as they returned to Ninja Ops, but Blake had a race just about to start... they wouldn't be able to warn him about Lothor for a few hours, maybe longer.

_Oh, Blake, _Tori thought, swallowing hard. _Please be careful._

"If Lothor's really back," Dustin said lowly, his expression unusually grim. "How are we gonna fight him with no powers?"

Good question.

They'd managed to defeat Lothor without their Ranger powers the last time, but only because he'd underestimated them. He wouldn't make that mistake again.

"Cam has been saving these," Sensei Watanabe sighed, holding out his hands. "For just such an occasion."

A soft golden glow filled his hands, forming an ornate wooden box.

"Shane, Tori," Sensei looked at each of them in turn, eyes both proud and sad at the same time. "It is with a heavy heart that I must give you your new Wind Morphers."

He opened the box and the three of them exchanged glances.

It was supposed to be over.

They'd done their part, they'd put their regular lives on hold once to fight Lothor, was it really fair that they had to do it all over again?

_If not us,_ Tori thought bitterly._ Then who?_

Lothor was their responsibility, it was their duty to contain his threat.

"A dark cloud has descended upon us," Sensei Watanabe said lowly. "It is time for you to resume your duties as Power Rangers."

Shane started to reach toward the box, then paused and looked over his shoulder.

Jaw set, Dustin gave a grim nod of agreement, and Shane's dark gaze flickered to Tori, questioning. He wasn't going to make this decision for them, he'd given up the mantle of their leader a long time ago, but it wasn't like any of them really had a choice anyway, so Tori just sighed and gave him a weak smile.

Taking a deep breath, Shane nodded, and that was it.

One by one they took their morphers from the box Sensei held out to them, and Tori felt a lump in her throat as she strapped hers to her wrist.

She'd forgotten how light they were.

And hadn't realized how bare her wrist felt without a morpher there.

Tori looked up, and found Sensei Watanabe watching her closely, with a knowing smile.

She smiled ruefully, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, and looked over at Shane and Dustin, nodding that she was ready.

"We won't let you down, Sensei," Shane vowed, and together they lifted their fists. "Let's do it!"

As she activated her morpher, Tori felt a hot, painful spark of electricity pass into her fingertips and she felt a cry of surprise rise up in her throat as a jolt of alarm shot through her, but then a purple haze descended over her.

And everything went black.


	3. Chapter 3

**Thursday, 12:41 p.m.**

**Reefside, California**

It was surreal.

Explosions, fire, debris hurtling through their air.

Black smoke billowing up from burning cars and flaming rubble.

The streets of Reefside looked like a war zone, like the city had become the target of one of Lothor's latest invasion attempts.

Only this wasn't Lothor's doing.

Not directly, at least.

Perched high above it all on a nearby rooftop, Hunter Bradley watched his friends wreak havoc on Reefside. Lights exploded, sending out a shower of glass in all directions, and buildings shook under the onslaught, chunks of concrete crumbling and raining down on the streets below.

"Shit," Hunter breathed.

"That's the fourth time you've said that," Cam observed flatly, without tearing his gaze away from the scene in front of them.

"And I repeat, _shit_," Hunter snapped. "Why are we just standing here?"

"Because, Hunter," Cam said slowly, in a tone that Hunter suspected he used with his students. "Ninjas though we may be, if we go up against evil Power Rangers, we're not going to last more than a few minutes."

Hunter wanted to argue with that, but given just how badly the new trio of Rangers trying to fight off their friends were getting thrashed, he had to admit Cam was right.

"This sucks," Hunter growled, shoving a hand through his hair in frustration. "I hate just standing here."

"I know," Cam murmured.

A shrill sound, metal shrieking, filled the air and they both winced.

Below, Dustin was hurling the door he'd just ripped off a car at the Blue Dino Ranger, and the kid barely ducked in time to avoid having his head decapitated. Shane was pummeling the Red Ranger mercilessly, and Hunter's stomach turned over at the sound of his friend's laughter, so familiar and yet so horribly distorted at the same time.

The female Dino Ranger wasn't faring much better.

Tori was wiping the floor with her, landing blows that Hunter knew from experience would leave bruises, if not break bones.

Even at her nicest Tori was a force to be reckoned with.

Now that she was evil she wasn't holding back, and for the first time Hunter was beginning to understand just how dangerous he must have been when he was under Lothor's control.

And how scared the others must have been.

Not just for him, but of him.

Rangers were powerful, but that had always been a good thing for them in their line of work.

Suddenly Hunter found himself uncertain if anyone should be given that kind of power. Even people like Dustin and Tori, who never wavered in their convictions and morals, weren't immune to spells and tricks.

If the three Wind Rangers could do this much damage in a mere few hours, he didn't want to think about what they could do if they continued to go unchecked.

And judging by how badly the Dino Rangers were losing, there didn't seem to be anyone to stop them.

Hunter was half-tempted to go down there, to try and reason with his friends, but at this point he wasn't sure anything could get through to them. Lothor's magic was strong, he knew that better than anyone. What made him think the fact that he was Tori's favorite brother-in-law would carry any sway with her right now, when she was just as likely to shoot him as she was to talk to him.

He wouldn't be much use to anyone dead.

Besides, even if she didn't kill him while under Lothor's spell, he was certain she'd kill him for being so stupid once the affects wore off.

The Wind Rangers were already going to be horrified, regardless of the fact that they hadn't had any control whatsoever over their actions, so there was no need to add to the guilt by letting them use him as a human punching bag until a better solution could present itself.

_Where's Sensei when you need him?_ Hunter groaned.

To be fair, Cam was pretty sure that his father had been kidnapped by Lothor, and that Lothor must have impersonated Sensei Watanabe to get Tori, Shane and Dustin to let their guard down, so it wasn't like he was off sitting by the pool sipping lemonade or anything.

But they sure could have used his help right about now.

The hairs on the back of his neck bristled, and that was the only warning he had before a dark blur shot down from the sky next to him.

"Blake," he sighed in relief as soon as his brother streaked in. "Am I glad to see you."

"I got here as fast as I could," Blake said apologetically, and they clapped one another on the back before Blake stepped back, nodding at Cam, and shoved his hands into his pockets. "What's up?"

Hunter and Cam exchanged a look.

"We've got trouble," Cam finally said, and nodded toward the street below. "Big trouble."

Blake turned, and confusion crossed his face, the beginnings of an amused smile turning into bafflement that slowly faded as the seriousness of the situation began to sink in.

"Tori?" he breathed.

For a long moment, Blake simply stared at the battle below, or more accurately, Hunter suspected, at his wife. Who just so happened to be slamming a fellow Power Ranger into a concrete wall, clearly hoping to shatter the poor girl's helmet, and maybe even her skull.

"What the hell is going on?" Blake finally demanded.

He whirled, dark eyes sharp and blazing with the kind of burning anger that could only be fueled by fear.

"Lothor," Hunter said quietly. "He's back."

"He's back?" Blake echoed flatly, anger lurking just beneath the surface. "He's back! What does that have to do with why Tori and the others are trying to burn down all of Reefside?"

"We're not sure how he did it," Cam spoke up. "But he's obviously turned them evil."

"Obviously," Blake snapped.

"Look, how he did it doesn't matter right now," Hunter said bluntly, intervening before emotions running high could make things get ugly. "The Dino Rangers are down there getting their asses kicked, and if we don't do something fast the Wind Rangers are going to kill them."

"What are we gonna do?" Blake asked at last, with a bitter laugh. "Ask Tori and the others to play nice?"

"We're going to the Abyss of Evil."

"Yeah, what he said," Hunter agreed, then froze a moment later as that sunk in, and slowly turned to pin Cam with a sharp glare. "What! We're going to do what?"

"Tell me I heard you wrong," Blake implored.

Instead of answering them, Cam glanced down at the street below, where the Dino Rangers were retreating. "Now's our chance," he said. "Let's go."

And he started down to the street, like that settled the matter.

For a long moment Blake and Hunter were frozen in place, staring after him, and then they looked at one another, incredulous, before breaking into a jog after the former Green Samurai Ranger, catching up with him just as he reached the street level.

"Are you nuts?" Blake demanded.

"Dude, I take back everything I ever said about you being smart," Hunter declared.

"Have a look at what they've done," Cam said sharply, gesturing at the destruction to be found in every direction. "We have to get to the Abyss. It's our only chance."

"You were there, right?" Hunter demanded. "You know what's inside of that thing!"

"Yeah, our powers," Cam retorted, as it was that simple.

Unfortunately for them, it kind of was.

"And we have to get them back," Cam continued, sounding irritatingly like Sensei Watanabe, making Cam wonder if the ability to nag was genetic. "If we're gonna have any chance of helping the Dino Rangers deal with Tori, Shane and Dustin."

Hunter opened his mouth to argue, but Blake cut him off.

"No way," Blake said sharply.

Slightly taken aback by his tone, Hunter looked at his brother in surprise. He wasn't exactly a big fan of the whole 'let's go back to the abyss that tried to kill us' plan, either, but one look at the hard glint to Blake's eyes and the way his clenched fists were shaking told him this wasn't just about the Abyss of Evil.

It was about Tori.

"No!" Blake repeated, shaking his head. "There's no possible way I'm going near that thing again."

Just like there was no way he was going to fight Tori.

Hunter understood, he really did.

In Blake's shoes he didn't think he would be able to fight the woman he loved, either. As it was, he wasn't looking forward to having to fight his sister-in-law, but better him than Blake.

"You guys don't get it, do you?" Cam sighed impatiently. "It's not just our powers down there. Whatever power sources Lothor gave to the others, they're not the real thing. If we can get their powers back from the Abyss-"

"We might be able to reverse Lothor's spell," Hunter concluded with a grim smile.

"And if we can't?" Blake demanded.

"We will," Hunter told him, and tried to sound as confident as he wished he felt. "We'll get Tori back, bro. But to do that, we've gotta go into the Abyss."

Blake closed his eyes, taking a deep breath.

"For Tori, dude," Hunter said.

"Yeah," Blake said, letting out a sigh and opening his eyes. "For Tori."

They streaked their way to the Abyss, and found the cavernous ravine now exposed to the sky, a testament to Lothor's escape, and Hunter helped Cam ready the repelling gear while Blake stared down into the Abyss silently, expression clouded and muscles tense.

Hunter let him be, guessing that when your wife turned evil and went on a rampage a guy needed to collect his thoughts.

Before long they had their lines secured and their harnesses on, and the three of them stood on the edge of the Abyss, balancing precariously over a vast nothingness.

"Uh, I just wanna say one last time," Blake said with a nervous smile. "I think this is a bad idea."

Later, when they were dangling from a ledge in the Abyss, it occurred to Hunter that in the future, assuming he survived the experience long enough to have a future, he really ought to pay more attention when Blake thought something was a bad idea.


	4. Chapter 4

**Thursday, 2:31 p.m.**

**Reefside, California**

His feet hit the ground and the world around him came into focus.

Ninja streaking wasn't for the faint of heart, the first time he'd attempted it when he was thirteen he'd spent a good ten minutes on the grass throwing up, with Hunter doubled over laughing nearby.

But Blake was older now, and his stomach had long since toughened up.

Nowadays the adrenaline rush got his blood pumping, and two seconds after he landed he was ready for anything.

Anything, of course, except for this.

At least before the Wind Rangers had been in uniform, faces hidden behind their helmets as they ravaged Reefside and attacked the Dino Rangers. Now his three teammates were fighting the unmorphed Dino Rangers in their ninja garb, and he couldn't delude himself with the hope that maybe it wasn't really them, that maybe it was someone else impersonating them under the helmets.

If Cam's plan didn't work...

_It will work,_ Blake thought, fiercely stomping out that traitorous doubt._ It has to._

Because he couldn't live without Tori.

The real Tori, not the evil incarnation Lothor had turned her into. The Tori who liked to slip out of bed to go for a morning surf before he even woke up, the Tori that liked tiger lilies and made him smiley face pancakes when he had a bad day.

That was the Tori he married, and he didn't know what he'd do if they didn't get her back.

He loved her, even this new world-domination friendly version, but the Tori that Lothor had unleashed on the world was just a pale shade of his wife.

"Shit," Hunter suddenly cursed, breaking Blake out of his reverie. "Cam!"

"I see it," Cam snapped, and started to run.

Confused, Blake frowned, looking back up the hill at the Wind Rangers and his eyes widened in alarm as he recognized the familiar movements of their arms as the pattern for activating their morphers.

_If they morph..._ he thought, his heart in his throat.

If they morphed, the plan was ruined.

"No!" Cam shouted loudly, drawing the attention of the both sets of Rangers on the top of the hill as he moved in their direction. "Wait!"

Blake followed, placing one hand on the railing in front of him and using it to vault himself over. Behind him, Hunter, never one to pass up an opportunity to rub it in about his height, casually swung one long leg over the top bar and pushed off his back foot, nimbly jumping the railing.

The Wind Rangers glanced at one another, as if assessing whether or not they were a threat.

"Wait... Blake?"

Turning his head at the familiar voice, Blake was startled to see Kira Ford, flanked by her friends Connor and Ethan, and suddenly the pieces clicked.

"That's how I know you," Kira concluded. "You're a Power Ranger."

_Apparently I'm not the only one, _Blake thought, but kept that to himself in the interest of keeping up the act Cam had laid out for them. _No wonder you reminded me of Tori._

"Good," Ethan said, sighing in relief. "Because we can use all the help we can get."

"We're not here to help you guys out," Blake informed them haughtily, moving with Cam and Hunter to stand with the Wind Rangers. "We stick with our own kind."

It was all he could do to keep himself from looking back at Tori.

But he couldn't afford to glance back at her, not now, when so much was riding on this little performance of theirs.

If they were going to save Tori and the others, they had to play this right.

Of course, his words weren't all an act.

He would fight anyone who tried to hurt Tori, evil or not, and he wasn't about to stand idly by and watch Shane and Dustin get attacked, either.

They were his teammates, his friends, and they would have done the same for him.

Hell, they had.

"Lothor has shown us the error of our ways," Hunter added, folding his arms and easing into a cold, cocky stance that brought back uneasy memories for Blake of another time when he'd been like this, a time when it hadn't been an act.

"Whoever doesn't follow us," Cam declared coldly. "We'll destroy."

The Dino Rangers exchanged grim, worried looks, and Blake knew they were thinking about how badly _three_ evil Rangers had beaten them.

Six would just be overkill.

"This is gonna be great," Dustin growled, punching his palm in dark anticipation.

"Wait," Cam said flatly, turning to hold out the real power discs. "First, you have to take these." At Shane's raised eyebrow, he smiled thinly. "A little power boost direct from the Abyss of Evil."

"But we already have our powers," Tori sneered.

Blake swallowed hard, trying to ignore the twinge in his chest when her eyes passed right over him, indifferent. Her face was hard and emotionless, like a stone mask, and her once brilliant blue eyes had lost their spark, fading to a dull and icy hue that almost seemed gray.

"Not these ones," Hunter retorted.

Again the Wind Rangers shared a look, not fully trusting them, but finally Shane looked back at Cam, eyes hard and steely. "You'd better be right about this," he warned.

"Believe me," Cam replied, and Blake could almost hear the smirk in his tone. "You won't be sorry."

One by one the Wind Rangers took their power discs.

_This is it,_ Blake thought, holding his breath. _If Cam was wrong..._

Dustin, Shane and Tori discarded the discs Lothor had given them and slipped their real power discs into place, and were suddenly hurled backward through the air as bursts of yellow, red and blue energy erupted from their respective morphers.

Blake rushed to Tori's side, his heart lodging in his throat at how still she was.

"Tori?" he breathed shakily.

Then, after an agonizing heartbeat, a soft groan escaped her lips and her eyes fluttered open, groggily flickering over his face, and then, to his relief, her eyes widened in surprise and she gasped, lips curving upward. "Blake?"

Smiling in relief, Blake took her hand and gently pulled her to her feet.

"Aww, dude what happened?" Dustin groaned with a sharp wince, rubbing the back of his head. "My bell is seriously rung."

"How did we get here?" Tori asked in bewilderment. "The last thing I remember..."

"Lothor," Blake sighed. "He's back."

_And he's going to pay for what he did to you, _he added silently.

"Yeah, we know," Shane said grimly, with the same steely resolve of his evil-self, only not quiet as terrifying. "Sensei told us."

"That wasn't Sensei," Hunter informed him bluntly.

"No, dude," Dustin insisted, shaking his head. "I know Sensei when I see him

"No," Blake said wearily. "It's Lothor."

"Okay..." Dustin frowned, clearly trying to make sense of it all, and then his expression lit up with enlightenment. "Unless it was Lothor dressed as Sensei, huh?"

Blake opened his mouth to retort, when Connor suddenly inserted himself in their midst.

"Okay, this is all highly amusing," he drawled, in a tone that made it clear he didn't think it was. "But does someone want to tell me what's going on?"

Shane frowned. "Eric?"

Connor blinked, then rolled his eyes in exasperation. "That would be my brother. I'm Connor."

"Also known as the guy you've been wailing on all day," Hunter piped up, earning a dark look from Connor and eliciting a troubled expression from Shane. "Long story short... these three are the new Power Rangers, Lothor made you guys evil, and you wiped the floor with them."

"Only because Dr. O told us to hold back," Connor insisted.

"Yeah, right," Kira scoffed with a smile. "They were totally kicking our asses and you know it."

She glanced at Blake, clearly wanting some answers and expecting some kind of explanation for all of this, but Blake couldn't worry about her now.

He had more important things to focus on.

"It's good to have you back," he told Tori, reaching out to tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear.

"I could say the same to you, hotshot," she retorted with a weak smile.

"It's good to have you _both_ back," Hunter declared, ruffling Blake's hair, and ignored the glare Blake shot him to clap Shane and Dustin on the shoulders. "To have all of you back."

"Were we at least cool evil?" Dustin inquired. "You know, all menacing like Darth Vader?"

"We didn't hurt anybody," Tori asked softly, saving them from having to respond to Dustin, but presenting them with a question they wanted to avoid just as badly. "Did we?"

Blake exchanged a look with Cam and Hunter, hesitant, and that must have been answer enough.

"How bad?" Tori demanded, looking instead to Kira.

"The city's pretty torn up," Kira admitted after a moment's pause. "People were injured, but no one died... I think."

"Dude," Dustin muttered despondently.

"Oh God," Tori moaned softly, shaking her head. "We have to help," she insisted, gazing up at Blake with wide, pleading blue eyes. "We have to fix this."

"We will," he promised. "But first we have to stop Lothor."

"Let's go back to Ninja Ops and talk to Sensei," Shane suggested. "The _real_ Sensei."

"He's not there," Cam cleared his throat and gave the Wind Rangers a pointed look that reminded Blake of the old days. "No one is, actually. It seems while you were evil you helped Lothor defeat and capture our students."

Shane's face became clouded at that news.

"It wasn't you," Blake told them, laying a hand on Tori's arm when she wouldn't look at him. "It wasn't your fault."

She bit her lip, but nodded.

"Did I attack Marah?" Dustin wanted to know, and he groaned without waiting for an answer. "She's gonna kill me, dude."

"Let's get back to Dr. O's and regroup," Connor suggested.

"Yeah," Ethan agreed. "He'll know what to do."

"Dad's gone to meet with him anyway," Cam said when they all looked in his direction. "So we might as well join him. Maybe he's picked up on Lothor's trail by now."

They started down the hill, and Blake could make out Ethan eagerly asking a bunch of ninja questions, which Dustin was more than ready to answer, but Blake hung back as the rest of the Power Rangers, both past and present, headed off.

Tori lingered at his side, and once they were alone he turned to her with a worried look.

"You sure you're okay?" he asked softly, letting his eyes rake over her in search of any sign of injury.

"My head is killing me and I can't remember what I did over the past few hours or who I hurt," she answered truthfully, and gave him a weak smile. "But yeah, I'm okay. Now that you're here."

"You know," Blake drawled, unable to resist teaching her. "There are easier ways to get me to come home early. Like, for instance," he waggled his eyebrows suggestively. "That little blue silky thing hanging in the closet?"

"Pig," Tori accused flatly.

"You love me," he retorted smugly.

"Really do," she said softly, tilting her head up to kiss him.

Blake closed his eyes, savoring the feeling of having his wife back in his arms, of being able to kiss her again after so many weeks apart.

After an all-too-short moment, they broke apart, and he sighed, knowing the others would be waiting for them. "Duty calls," she said lightly, and gave him a smile that melted away all other concerns.

"Yeah," he agreed, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. "Let's go save the world."

When they got down to the parking lot nearby, Blake was surprised to find the red car that had been there earlier, presumably Connor's, gone, and Hunter's lone figure leaning against a light pole at the edge of the lot.

"They went ahead," Hunter explained without them having to ask. "Thought you needed a minute, so I told them I'd wait for you and we'd streak there."

"And how do we find 'there'?" Blake asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Got it covered," Hunter said without concern. "They told me how to get to Oliver's place."

Tori smiled, leaning away from Blake to kiss Hunter on the cheek. "Thanks for coming after us, Hunter," she said.

"Hey," Hunter said, smirking, and shrugged his shoulders. "What's a brother-in-law for if not to save you from evil space ninjas who turn you into evil ninjas yourself, right?"


	5. Chapter 5

**Thursday, 4:01 p.m.**

**Reefside, California**

It felt good to be back in uniform.

She'd forgotten how addicting it was, how much the adrenaline rush got to her.

Being a Ranger had always been about responsibility, about duty, and more often than not it had been a burden, but holding the power was also a lot of fun.

Sometimes she wondered if that was why they'd been chosen, because they could love it.

Anyone could pick up a morpher and fight the forces of evil if they had to, but being a Ranger was all about danger and risk, two things that a skater, a surfer and a couple of motocross gearheads were compulsively drawn to.

The loss of their powers had hit them all hard at first, but over time that ache had faded.

Over the course of a few short years, they'd all moved on with their lives, found other better things to keep them busy, but now Tori found herself missing it.

Maybe it would be different if they'd actually had a choice in the matter.

After all, nobody could be a Ranger forever.

Except for Tommy Oliver apparently, but he was a special case.

But it hadn't been their decision to give up the power, the power had been stolen from them, and, Tori was suddenly realizing, she'd been carrying around a touch of bitterness over that fact ever since.

_Now the only question is,_ she thought somberly. _Do I want it back?_

She'd loved it in the old days, but she loved her new life, too.

The Wind Academy was, if possible, even more dear to her now than it had been during her days as a student. She loved teaching and she loved her students, who she was constantly learning from as much as they were learning from her. When Sensei Watanabe first asked her to stay on at the school after graduating, she'd been uncertain, not because she didn't want to, but because she wasn't sure what she could give to future generations of ninjas.

After all, she wasn't a leader like Shane, subtly wise like Dustin.

But Sensei had a way of seeing into them all.

_Together you are three points of a triangle, strong and unyielding, but without one the triangle is broken..._

Or, as Hunter had simplified, you don't split up a winning team.

In a way, though, they had split up the team, mostly because with the loss of their powers there was no need for the team to stay in one place.

Hunter had returned to the Thunder Academy to teach, but ninja streaking meant he was just a short trip away whenever she felt the need to have lunch or see a movie. But Blake had gone off to chase his dream with Factory Blue, and his hectic schedule made streaking home at night downright impossible, so Tori went weeks at a time during the circuit's peek season without seeing her husband in person.

And even with Cam, Dustin and Shane teaching at the Academy with her, that didn't mean they were always around.

Personal lives had been a luxury they couldn't afford during their Ranger days.

Now it was a different story.

"Hey," Connor's voice caught her ears over the jubilant cheering of victory and she turned her head to see him laying a hand on Shane's shoulder. "Nice moves, you guys."

"Back at you, bro," Shane laughed, clapping him on the back.

Despite herself, Tori smiled behind her faceplate as all of the boys, her husband and brother-in-law included, slapped hands in a display of that youthful macho bravado that she suspected they would never fully grow out of.

"All right!"

"Dude, did you see the way that monster blew up?"

"That was a pretty sick maneuver you guys pulled, you'll have to teach it to me."

"Wow," a female voice said, and Tori looked up to see the Yellow Dino Ranger, Kira, moving up beside her, likewise staring at the boys. "So it's not just my teammates, it's all male Rangers."

"Afraid so," Tori agreed with a laugh.

"How did you do it?" Kira asked, groaning. "Most days I feel like they're going to drive me insane."

Tori smiled, knowing that feeling all too well.

"You two better watch it," Blake drawled, coming over with his arms folded over his chest and his head titled at a wry angle. "Don't forget that us guys outnumber you."

"I think we can handle it," Tori retorted.

Even with the helmets on, she could see the smirk tugging its way onto her husband's lips, could picture that familiar mixture of cockiness and amusement shining in his dark eyes. "Oh, really?" he asked dryly. "Is that so?"

Tori opened her mouth to answer when a sharp, high-pitched noise filled the air, drawing their attention back to the clearing ahead where they'd destroyed Lothor's new goons.

A flash of bright energy shot down from the sky, slamming into the ground.

And in its wake two figures tumbled into sight.

Tori blinked in surprise, recognizing the outfits before she saw the faces, and she drew a sharp breath, glancing in Dustin's direction to see his reaction.

"Marah?" she heard him murmur in confusion.

It was Marah, all right, along with Kapri, but the sisters hardly looked like themselves.

At least, not the Marah and Kapri that Tori had come to know over the past few years, who she considered friends. The women in front of her now were a bad memory, of days when their allegiance had been to a decidedly less pleasant side of the fight.

"Oh!" Marah cried, spotting them. "Oh, guys!"

Tori exchanged a startled look with Blake, who shrugged his shoulders in response.

"Hey, Cam," Kapri called, as he moved forward from the rest of the Rangers to intercept his cousins, although Tori wasn't sure if that was for Marah and Kapri's benefit, or theirs.

"What are you guys doing here?" Cam demanded.

"Is that any way to greet family?" Kapri retorted, giving him an annoyed look.

"Yeah," Marah agreed, positively bubbly as she held up a strange purple bottle. "Especially since we brought you a present! Look..."

With that she uncorked the bottle, and a purple mist rose out of the top, lifting into the air and wafting a few yards away before it began to spiral down to the ground, spreading out across the earth as solid forms began to take shape.

Tori's heart surged in her throat, not daring to hope...

"It's our students!" Shane cried.

Sure enough, as the mist fell away it left behind a large number of confused and disoriented ninjas, and Tori sighed in relief. "Thank God," she whispered.

"Hey," Shane called out to their students, jogging over. "Everybody okay?"

Tori hurried after him, with the rest of the Rangers on her heels, and hurried over the younger students, who were looking around nervously. "You guys all right?" she asked, touching their heads one by one as her faceplate retracted. "No one's hurt, are they?"

"We're okay, Sensei," one of Dustin's students answered, then bit his lip. "Uh... are you?"

Despite everything that had happened that day, Tori couldn't help laughing, and she gave the boy a warm squeeze, which, being a prepubescent kid, he promptly squirmed away from. "We're fine now," she assured them all. "Lothor's spell was broken, you guys don't have to worry, he can't control us anymore."

"Where's Sensei?" the boy asked, looking around.

It took Tori only a moment to realize he was asking about Dustin, not Sensei Watanabe.

She glanced over her shoulder and found Cam talking with Kapri, shaking his head at whatever his cousin was saying, but Marah was nowhere in sight.

Unsurprisingly, neither was Dustin.

"I think he needed a minute alone," she said carefully.

The kid made a face. "Oh, he's kissing Marah again, isn't he?"

Without waiting for an answer, the boy scurried off in the direction of his friends, and Tori shook her head, marveling at how unaffected the younger students were by their captivity. Most of the older students had been at the Academy when Lothor first attacked, so a few hours imprisoned in a mystical bottle was nothing compared to the long months they'd spent as Lothor's hostages the last time.

"Sensei Bradley?"

Tori looked up, and was amused to see Hunter's head jerking up, as well, as one of the younger students approached. "Yes, Kai?" she asked.

"Can we eat soon?" the boy pleaded. "I'm starving."

"Being trapped in a bottle works up quite the appetite, huh?" Blake asked with a wink.

"We'll get you some food as soon as possible, okay?" Tori promised, fixing the boy with a warm smile. "Why don't you go round up the rest of your classmates so we can get you guys home before your parents start to worry too much?"

"Okay."

They watched Kai trot off, and Hunter shook his head. "You know, bro, it's a good thing you decided not to teach," he told Blake. "Your wife is one Sensei Bradley too many."

"Hey," Tori protested, swatting him in the chest.

"Wife?"

It was Kira who spoke, and Tori turned to see her tugging off her helmet, brown hair tumbling over her shoulders in waves. Kira glanced at her, then back to Blake, raising an eyebrow inquisitively.

"You guys are married?"

"A year next month," Blake answered, draping an arm around Tori's shoulders. "And then the honeymoon's over."

"What honeymoon?" Tori laughed. "You left for the circuit right after the wedding."

"Hey, we went to Hawaii for two weeks last summer," Blake protested. "Remember that? Remember how you ditched me to surf the Pipeline?"

"First of all, it was the Pipeline," Tori retorted. "And it's not a real honeymoon when your brother and the guys tag along." Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Hunter open his mouth, and she rolled her eyes. "Even if they did get their own hotel room," she added, giving him a pointed look before turning her smirk back on Blake. "Hawaii doesn't cut it, mister, you still owe me."

"Hate to tell you, bro," Hunter chuckled. "But you're not going to win this one."

"How come I never get to win one?" Blake muttered, but the corner of his mouth lifted of its own accord even as he tried to hide a smile.

"You gave up your right to win the day you said your vows," Hunter quipped.

"It was worth it," Blake said, and Tori's heart skipped a beat, as it always did, when he flashed her that shy half-smile she loved so much, the one he reserved just for her. His brother, upon seeing that smile, coughed something into his hand that sounded suspiciously like the word 'whipped', but Tori ignored him.

"Yeah?" she asked, with a smile of her own.

"Well," Blake replied dryly, his smile turning into a smirk. "I didn't really have much of a choice. See my wife's this badass ninja. I had to marry her, or she would have kicked my ass."


End file.
